


The Sleeping Aid

by Derien



Category: Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-10-02
Updated: 2004-10-02
Packaged: 2017-10-14 09:37:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/147889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Derien/pseuds/Derien
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bertie can't sleep. Jeeves, as always, has the answer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Sleeping Aid

I have often said Jeeves is always right, and he is. It seems whenever I have a go at asserting myself against his always-right-ness I run into a quagmire of trouble, or make an ass of myself, if not both. In the case of the story I'm about to relate I didn't even make a go at asserting myself, from the start. I was at the end of my rope and didn't have the what-do-you-call-it - verve. I was done in from nights of no rest.

Normally, of course, I have no trouble sleeping at all - the little grey cells of Bertie Wooster are not in a habit of vibrating often, and certainly not in the wee small hours of the morning. I'm sure Jeeves is convinced I don't have enough grey cells to worry, but there you are. My normal method of having a few stiff drinks, and then perhaps a few more, was not working. I would wake from a dream of Aunt Agatha pursuing me with some lame duck in tow, flopping like a trout on the line in a froth of sweat - myself, that is, as the fish, not the girl she was dragging. After a week of this treatment my eyes resembled nothing so much as the holes in a snowman where the coal has fallen out due to warm weather, and Jeeves was looking on me pityingly. In fact, this very moment, as I awoke yet again with a twitch, he was gazing down at me pityingly.

"Sir," he murmured gently, as he bent to offer a silver salver with a drink upon it to my waiting hand, "May I suggest a possible remedy for your tensions?"

"Anything, Jeeves, anything at all. I am at your disposal. Your mercy, even."

"It has occurred to me that massage may aid you, sir."

"Massage?"

"I understand it can be very relaxing, sir."

"Jeeves, I know you're right, but I'm hardly going out to a masseur at this hour."

"As to that, sir, it may be possible that, for the purposes at hand, this task could be performed passably sufficiently by me, sir."

"You?" I could hear my voice squeak at the end of the word, as my stomach seemed to be attempting to roll itself over. I was sure I hadn't eaten anything bad at dinner, but it may have been caused by all the alcohol I'd already ingested.

"Certainly, sir. If you will take up your robe and wait in the sitting room for a few moments I will prepare the bed appropriately and fetch unguents."

Faced with such a firm tone my sleep-deprived mind did not have a chance to form any resistance. I took up my robe and retired with the drink to the sitting room immediately. It was truly only a matter of minutes before he returned to beckon me to return to the bedroom, but the delay had given me time to notice that my heart had begun beating harder. It seemed the stomach had been only the first sign of an attack of nerves. Jeeves had not been in my service for very long, at that point, in a relative sort of way, but as I probably have mentioned elsewhere, it had been barely two weeks after he came to me before I had surrendered all claim to being the brains of the house. Nevertheless he had been with me long enough for us to have had a few rows. As I have probably mentioned elsewhere, few and far between are the people who willingly desire the company of Bertram Wooster for more than a few days at a time, yet somehow we had transcended rows and he continued to withstand my presence on a fairly continual basis. The respect, and indeed, affection, which I had already conceived for this great man was not to be underestimated, and the fact that he did my tie up for me every morning had become increasingly difficult for me to believe. Not least for the fact it seemed a genuine loss to the rest of the realm that he wasted that great brain on taking care of a silly blighter like myself. I was quite aware of my ridiculous good luck in landing a gem such as Jeeves as a gentleman's gentleman.

As he beckoned from the bedroom door it came home to me what he had proposed. Unguents! That word had a distinctly sybaritic sound to it, if sybaritic was the word I wanted. I was pretty sure unguents referred to oils, because I couldn't see any way that cows would fit into this picture, unless it referred to oils that were somehow derived from cows. Oils and such things seemed to indicate my paragon intending to put his bare hands on my bare skin. Suddenly I was, as you might say, a bit whiffled. Snookered, even. I mean to say, I had gone to public school, I knew the sorts of things that that sort of thing can lead to, and they were the sorts of things that I hadn't dared entertain notions of in regard to Jeeves. Daily, now, I had to carefully remind myself that I did not dare entertain such notions, and quash them assiduously when he did up my tie or some other such small, intimate service which he regularly performed, as I have said, to my increasing astonishment.

Those were the sorts of thoughts that uselessly occupied my small number of vibrating grey cells as my feet covered the short distance from the sitting room through into the bedroom.

He had remade the bed with at least two sets of older sheets, and possibly other unknown and, to me, unguessable, substrata, as well as placing a number of towels conveniently on the side table next to a container something like a small earthenware sugar bowl.

"I will step out for a few moments, sir, to allow you to disrobe and place a sheet over yourself."

Well, that was something, at least. There was a sheet involved. This bucked me up a bit. He trickled from the room like a cool mountain stream, and I complied, quickly, getting myself tangled numerous times in my pyjamas. Eventually I was face down on the bed with a sheet tossed lightly over myself, feeling foolish, and he shimmered back into the room with impeccable timing as soon as I had arranged myself yet before I could think much more about the situation.

Still, I was made somewhat nervous again by his appearance, as he had not only removed his jacket and collar, and rolled up his sleeves, but also removed his shoes and socks. Seeing him in such a state of semi-undress did nothing at all toward making my own nudity feel more comfortable. Quite the contrary. The slight bucking up that I had received from the whole sheet business was immediately lost. Although, if you can forgive me being so crass (I suppose I won't be able to avoid it, in this story), the little fellow was beginning to feel a bit bucked up, much to my chagrin.

"If you would slide over just a little, sir, so that I may seat myself on the edge of the bed, I will begin on your shoulders."

I did, and he did, and he pulled the sheet back a bit and dipped his fingers into the little pot, rubbed his hands briskly, and began, as he had said, on my shoulders. It should have been greatly relaxing -- strong fingers moving in firm circles, kneading my muscles -- and I'm sure would have been if the service had been performed by a stranger, or at least by someone to whom I was not quite so attached. As it was I wasn't finding this experience at all what you'd call relaxing.

"Sir, you don't seem to be relaxing."

"I bally well realize that, Jeeves."

I didn't mean to snap, but really. When a chap's obviously not relaxing, in fact doing the very opposite, it might make him a bit testy if the cause of that situation notices.

By this time he had somehow finished on my back and begun on my legs, working his way up from my calves. After a few more moments of this Jeeves would be forced to admit that, contrary to his usual successes, his plan was not clickety-clacking similar to trains under the aegis of dictators. At that moment I was leaning toward the possibility of performing a prefrontal lobotomy on myself with a crochet hook in order to escape the yearnings this little session had awakened. I couldn't imagine anything short of that would do the job, but at least then I might also get some sleep.

"Sir... "

"Yes, Jeeves!?"

"There is yet another technique I could attempt."

"Oh for heaven's sake, Jeeves. Fine! Whatever you wish to do, let's get it over with."

Barely had I said that then I felt his fingers moving higher up my thighs.

"Very good, sir." I had been hiding my face in my arms to conceal it's rather beet-red state from him, but something in his tone compelled me to turn my head enough to peek at him with one eye. His expression was as somber as ever; perhaps a touch more so than usual, with a certain concentrated quality. He added a bit more of his unguent to his fingers and slid them beneath the scrap of sheeting that still concealed perhaps a square foot of my body.

At my jump and small yelp (really, it was nothing like that of a schoolgirl confronted with a large spider, despite what he claims) he remonstrated with me, "Really sir, you could at least attempt to hold still."

I attempted to make light of it by quipping, "Look, Jeeves, if you get any more intimate one of us will have to kiss the other!"

"Why, yes, sir, I believe you are correct."

His hand slid from my buttock up my back to my shoulder, as he slid himself up the bed slightly.

"What?"

In my surprise I rolled a bit and lifted my head to regard him.

"With your usual perspicacity, sir, I believe you have hit upon the probable next step in the solution to the problem of your inability to sleep."

Thereupon he proceeded to do so, a careful and gentle touch of his lips to mine.

"Now will you lie still, sir, so that I may begin the next stage of the massage?"

I stared up at him. What does one say, when one's paragon does something like that? I was kerflumoxed, I don't mind telling you. But never let it be said that the Woosters won't rally and charge into the fray, or, as it may be, that other thing that all's fair in. In a moment I had regained a bit of composure.

"No! No, Jeeves, I bloody well won't! I won't lie still at all until I get a better kiss than that!" I whooped.

I spun in the bed, showing probably a greater turn of speed than I'd been able to manage since this whole sleepless episode had begun, and flung an arm around the back of his neck, pulling him down atop me. I soon discovered the correctness of my conjecture -- Jeeves is just as skilled at kissing as any of his other many talents.

And that was the end of my sleepless period. For, as he had correctly concluded, what I needed to calm my mind was, in fact, him.

***  
Bonus! LucyLou drew me an illustration!  



End file.
